Michael Crichton, 66; wrote 'Jurassic Park', created 'ER' - The Boston Globe Obituaries Michael Crichton, 66; wrote 'Jurassic Park', created 'ER' Michael Crichton started writing professionally while a student at Harvard Medical School (above). (Julian Brown for The Boston Globe/ 1969 file) Globe Wires / November 6, 2008 | Text size – + LOS ANGELES - Michael Crichton, who wrote such best-selling novels as "The Andromeda Strain" and "Jurassic Park," directed such movies as "Coma" and "The Great Train Robbery," and created the long-running TV drama "ER," has died. He was 66. Dr.

Crichton, who put himself through Harvard Medical School by writing potboilers under several pseudonyms before becoming a novelist whose books sold more than 150 million copies worldwide, died Tuesday in Los Angeles after what his family described as a "courageous and private battle against cancer." "Michael's talent outscaled even his own dinosaurs of 'Jurassic Park,' " filmmaker Steven Spielberg, who directed the movie version of that novel, said in a statement. "He was the greatest at blending science with big theatrical concepts, which is what gave credibility to dinosaurs again walking the Earth." That synthesizing of science and storytelling began at Harvard. After earning his undergraduate in anthropology in 1964 and spending a year on a teaching fellowship at Cambridge University, he entered the medical school. To help pay his tuition, he began writing paperback thrillers under the pen names John Lange and Jeffery Hudson. His 1968 medical thriller "A Case of Need," won an Edgar Allan Poe Award from the Mystery Writers of America.

While still studying medicine at Harvard, he wrote his first best-seller: "The Andromeda Strain," a fast-paced scientifically and technologically detailed thriller about a team of scientists attempting to save humanity from a deadly microorganism brought to Earth by a military satellite. It was made into a movie in 1971. After getting his medical degree, Dr. Crichton moved to California and eventually abandoned medicine to become a full-time writer. "I don't like being locked into someone else's reality. People tend to be gladiators, with nets," he told The Boston Globe in 1988. "What I heard when I gave up doctoring for writing was: 'This is ridiculous!' 'You're nuts!' You're a fool!' " Instead, he became rich and famous. For the next four decades, the 6-foot-9 writer was a towering presence in the worlds of publishing and filmmaking. His novels in the '70s and '80s included "The Terminal Man," "The Great Train Robbery," "Eaters of the Dead," "Congo," and "Sphere." Dr.

Crichton made his feature film directing debut in 1973 with "Westworld," which he also wrote, about a fantasy theme park for wealthy vacationers whose fun is spoiled when malfunctioning androids turn deadly. Yul Brynner was the leader of the marauding androids. Dr. Crichton directed five other movies in the '70s and '80s, including "Coma." For his adaptation of that Robin Cook novel, Dr. Crichton returned to his Boston ties. He filmed much of the movie in Eastern Massachusetts, including hospital scenes at Boston City Hospital. As a novelist, Dr. Crichton came back stronger than ever in the 1990s with bestsellers such as "Jurassic Park," "Rising Sun," "Disclosure," and "Timeline." During the same decade, he co-wrote the screenplay for "Jurassic Park," the 1993 Spielberg-directed blockbuster hit; and he co-wrote the screenplay for the 1996 action-thriller "Twister" with his fourth wife, actress Anne-Marie Martin, with whom he had a daughter, Taylor. Dr.

Crichton also created "ER," the long-running NBC medical drama that debuted in 1994 and became the No. 1 series the next year. This season will be the series' last. Neal Baer, a physician who became an executive producer on "ER," was a fourth-year medical student at Harvard University when he was sent Dr. Crichton's script. "I said, 'Wow, this is like my life.' Baer said. John Wells, another executive producer of "ER," called the author "an extraordinary man. Brilliant, funny, erudite, gracious, exceptionally inquisitive, and always thoughtful. "No lunch with Michael lasted less than three hours and no subject was too prosaic or obscure to attract his interest. Sexual politics, medical and scientific ethics, anthropology, archaeology, economics, astronomy, astrology, quantum physics, and molecular biology were all regular topics of conversation." By then, the prolific writer who closely guarded his private life had become a dominant figure in popular culture. He even had a dinosaur named for him, Crichton's ankylosaur. Known for his intellectual curiosity, energy and drive, Dr. Crichton was a self-described workaholic.

"He works hard," Anne-Marie Martin told Vanity Fair in 1994. "Toward the end of a book it's like living with a body and Michael is somewhere else. Then, when the book's finished, Michael comes back." When he wasn't writing fiction, Dr. Crichton periodically turned to nonfiction, including "Jasper Johns," a 1977 portrait of the artist; and the 1988 autobiographical book "Travels." He also wrote a book on information technology, "Electronic Life" (1983), formed a small software company in the early '80s, designed a computer game, and shared a 1995 Academy Award for technical achievement for pioneering computerized motion picture budgeting and scheduling. The oldest of four children, John Michael Crichton was born Oct. 23, 1942, in Chicago and grew up in Roslyn, N.Y. He developed wide interests at an early age, he later said, recalling his mother taking her children to plays, museums, movies, and concerts several times a week. Although he said his father, an editor with Advertising Age, displayed a streak of meanness, Dr.

Crichton praised both parents for not setting limits on their children's exploration. "They were always saying, 'You can do that.' So I never had the feeling there was some area that I was incompetent in," he told Vanity Fair in 1994. Dr. Crichton said he wrote extensively from an early age. In third grade, he wrote a nine-page play for a puppet show. At 13, he started submitting short stories to magazines, and he sold a travel article to the New York Times when he was 14. He also wrote for the Harvard Crimson. A complete list of surviving family members, who include his fifth wife, Sherri, and daughter Taylor, was not available. Material from the Los Angeles Times and Associated Press were used in this obituary. © Copyright 2008 Globe Newspaper Company.

'Jurassic Park' author, 'ER' creator Crichton dies - CNN.com 'Jurassic Park' author, 'ER' creator Crichton dies Story Highlights Michael Crichton wrote several best-sellers, including "Jurassic Park" Crichton, a physician, also helped create hit TV show "ER" Crichton died after "courageous and private battle against cancer," release says LOS ANGELES, California (CNN) -- Michael Crichton, who helped create the TV show "ER" and wrote the best-sellers "Jurassic Park," "The Andromeda Strain," "Sphere" and "Rising Sun," has died in Los Angeles, his public relations firm said in a news release. Michael Crichton, here in 2005, was a director and best-selling author. He co-created the TV series "ER." Crichton died unexpectedly Tuesday "after a courageous and private battle against cancer," the release said. He was 66.

Watch more about the life of Crichton » "Jurassic Park" -- perhaps his best-known work -- concerned capturing the DNA of dinosaurs and bringing them to life on a modern island, where they soon run amok; "The Andromeda Strain," his first major fiction success, involves an alien microorganism that's studied in a special military compound after causing death in a nearby community. Crichton also invited controversy with some of his scientific views. He was an avowed skeptic of global climate change, giving lectures warning against "consensus science." He later took on global warming and the theories surrounding it in his 2004 novel, "State of Fear," which attracted attacks in its own right from scientists, including NASA climatologist James Hansen. iReport.com: Were you a fan? Share your tributes. Crichton was a distinctive figure in the entertainment business, a trained physician whose interests included writing, filmmaking and television. (He was physically distinctive as well, standing 6 feet 9 inches.) He published "The Andromeda Strain" while he was still a medical student at Harvard Medical School.

He wrote a story about a 19th-century train robbery, called "The Great Train Robbery," and then directed the 1979 film version. He also directed several other films, including "Westworld" (1973), "Coma" (1978), "Looker" (1981) and "Runaway" (1984). In 1993, while working on the film version of "Jurassic Park" with Steven Spielberg , he teamed with the director to create "ER." The NBC series set in a Chicago emergency room debuted in 1994 and became a huge hit, making a star of George Clooney. Crichton originally wrote the script for the pilot in 1974. "Michael's talent out-scaled even his own dinosaurs of 'Jurassic Park,' " said Spielberg, a friend of Crichton's for 40 years, according to The Associated Press. "He was the greatest at blending science with big theatrical concepts, which is what gave credibility to dinosaurs again walking the Earth. ... Michael was a gentle soul who reserved his flamboyant side for his novels.

There is no one in the wings that will ever take his place." Crichton was "an extraordinary man. Brilliant, funny, erudite, gracious, exceptionally inquisitive and always thoughtful," "ER" executive producer John Wells told the AP. "No lunch with Michael lasted less than three hours and no subject was too prosaic or obscure to attract his interest. Sexual politics, medical and scientific ethics, anthropology, archaeology, economics, astronomy, astrology, quantum physics, and molecular biology were all regular topics of conversation." Michael Crichton was born in Chicago in 1942 and grew up in New York's suburbs. His father was a journalist and Michael loved the writing profession. He went to medical school partly out of a concern he wouldn't be able to make writing a career, but the success of "The Andromeda Strain" in 1969 -- the book was chosen by the Book-of-the-Month Club and optioned by Hollywood -- made him change his mind, though he still had an M.D. Though most of Crichton's books were major best-sellers involving science, he could ruffle feathers when he took on social issues.

"Rising Sun" (1992) came out during a time when Americans feared Japanese ascendance, particularly when it came to technology. "Disclosure" (1994) was about a sexual harassment case. iReport.com: How did Crichton's work affect you? Share your tributes Crichton won an Emmy, a Peabody, a Writers Guild of America Award for "ER," and won other awards as well. "Through his books, Michael Crichton served as an inspiration to students of all ages, challenged scientists in many fields, and illuminated the mysteries of the world in a way we could all understand," the news release said. Crichton was married five times and had one child. A private funeral service is expected. USATODAY.com - 'Jurassic Park' author wins control of Internet name Posted 12/4/2002 5:52 PM 'Jurassic Park' author wins control of Internet name GENEVA (AP)  Best-selling author Michael Crichton, who wrote Jurassic Park and created the television series ER, has won control of the Internet name in a ruling by a United Nations panel.

The panel ordered the transfer of the domain name to Crichton after he complained to the World Intellectual Property Organization that it was being used illegally. The ruling Tuesday said the registered owner of the name — Alberta Hot Rods of Alberta, Canada — had no rights or interests in the name. Crichton's lawyers told the panel the domain linked to another Web site, which contained advertising but made no reference to Crichton or his work. The site's owner did not file a defense. Anyone can register a domain name for a few dollars, which has led so-called "cybersquatters" to file for famous names to make a fast buck from those who want the names. Some names are worth millions of dollars. The U.N. arbitration system, which started in 1999, allows those who think they have the right to a domain to get it back without having to fight a costly legal battle or paying large sums of money. Since his 1971 novel, The Andromeda Strain, was made into a movie, Crichton has enjoyed a string of literary and Hollywood successes. Among his novels and original screenplays that have been turned into feature films are Twister, Disclosure and Rising Sun.

Copyright 2005 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. He wrote Jurassic Park and created ER. So why does America's highest-paid writer still doubt himself? | Books | The Guardian He wrote Jurassic Park and created ER. So why does America's highest-paid writer still doubt himself? As his new novel hits the bookstores, Michael Crichton talks to Michael Ellison He wrote Jurassic Park and created ER. So why does America's highest-paid writer still doubt himself? As his new novel hits the bookstores, Michael Crichton talks to Michael Ellison Wednesday 17 November 1999 06.08 EST Share on Messenger Close Michael Crichton stretches his lofty frame back in the seat, hands clasped behind his head, the lines beside his eyes deepening as he considers the matter in hand. Silence. He shifts position so that the fingers of his left hand are obscuring part of his face. More silence. Surely the question is not that difficult: what has all your power and money bought you?

Finally the man who is said to be America's highest-paid writer answers, though not before contemplating a paper cup containing ridiculously sweet coffee: "It allows me to be resented wherever I go." He's joking, though he might not have been. Crichton was not pleased by stories coming out of Hollywood which had it that he was having trouble finding a taker for the film rights to his new book, Timeline, published yesterday. "In any undertaking of this sort there are people who wish you ill and it's not difficult to work out who they are. That was a misinformation campaign that was very explicitly being done by certain people in Los Angeles." In the event, he settled for a complicated deal that gives him a share of the picture's gross takings, a pretty safe bet when one considers that his movies have grossed considerably more than $1bn. Forbes magazine placed him seventh, with earnings of $65m, in its list last year of the richest entertainers. You might think that, in the circumstances, someone who has sold more than 100m books, worked on some of the most successful films ever made and created one of the best-received television series of the 90s would not give a damn.

You might also think that someone who has sold 100m books would be relatively confident that people like his work. "I never have a sense when I'm working that I'm succeeding. Never have that sense. All I feel is that what I've put down isn't awful, it isn't a disaster. I don't know how to avoid self-doubt. There's inherent anxiety for me. This book I wrote three times over: it can be disheartening when you see how much doesn't fit." The writer, who at 57 has been married four times and is in therapy, concedes readily that he is an outsider. And that he is very tall. "It was a problem growing up," says 6ft 9in Crichton. "And it still is at certain times. I'm in desperate trouble at cocktail parties. I can't hear anything anybody says, I really can't. So this means that I have to sit down and then they think 'he came to the party, sat in a corner and never moved'. So there are those kinds of differentiation. I'm used to it, I'm not complaining.

It's probably inevitable." But Crichton values this detachment for the part it plays in his role as a writer. "I remember hearing someone complain that John Updike had come to their house for dinner and he sat back and didn't participate. I thought 'what did you expect?' James Thurber's wife would look at him in dinner parties and shout down the table 'Thurber, stop writing.' She could see in his expression some way in which he had withdrawn. But it's also true in some other ways that I don't ever fit." If Crichton ever found a way to fit in he should not be short of topics of conversation, punctuated though his sentences often are by silences of up to 30 seconds. He has written 11 novels and four works of non-fiction under his own name, another 10 books pseudonomously, directed six movies, created the much-admired television series ER, worked as an anthropology lecturer, a doctor, headed a software company and invented a computer game. Crichton has taken as the glue for many of his novels subjects that feed off and anticipate topicality, such as economics (Rising Sun), sexual harassment at work (Disclosure) and genetics (Jurassic Park).

In the new one he employs quantum technology to tell an adventure story about three historians who travel to medieval France to try to rescue their professor. "I was quite interested in the developments that were occurring all during the period when I was writing the book. That was the time in which quantum teleportation had just been demonstrated. It was seen as a very exciting something, whatever it might be. Since time travel is impossible I had to find a technology that was not mature, that offered potential, and unclear potential. And the only one really that I'm aware of is quantum technology. "But I don't have any intention to inform people, the path I've taken is to inform myself," he says, fastidiously sweeping dust from the table-top. "I prefer to do books that address issues but you can't do that constantly or you become a scold and the kids aren't interested in that. A lot of my readership is young." Even the least sophisticated reader would have no difficulty with his plain writing about often complex subjects, devoid of adornment and a deliberate absence of literary style. "I think from the beginning I've been anti-literary.

The Andromeda Strain [his first big success] was written as if it was non-fiction, shorn of all the ordinary fictional devices, all insight into character and devoid of all stylistic procedures. Those things would convey to the reader that it was not true. There are many, many ways to tell readers 'this is an invention.' In terms of style, I'm attempting not to indicate that. "It's also a deep tendency I have that comes from being temperamental because when I was directing, people would say to me 'well, it's quite efficient but it doesn't have a distinct signature, you don't have a distinct style.' I don't want that. My idea is that you should be looking at the movie, not at the style." He pauses yet again and shrugs his shoulders. "It's a way to make something not of interest. I will use a variety of words in speech that I won't use in writing. Because they're too, I don't know, complicated." Perhaps surprisingly for a writer who has made so much use of science and technology in his books, Crichton is sceptical about the true worth of the internet. "I think it's the home-shopping network.

It's a new technology that's being trumpeted outrageously. It's just another component. I think it's a problem and it's going to continue to be a problem. Now there's no such thing as privacy: details aren't private, sexual acts aren't private. We're in an era where there are all these great stories and none of them are true." Crichton, of course, has profited handsomely from fiction masquerading as fact but he is less than proprietorial about his work. "I think that's wrong-headed. All I've got to do is write them. I don't sell them, I don't buy them. In a certain way it's got nothing to do with me. You've written it and then something else happens to it which maybe produces critical success or commercial success or no success, or something in the middle. That's where the ball goes when I've thrown it." He might remain aloof from the process but that does not mean he is totally indifferent to its results. Should Crichton see someone on an airplane with one of his books he is pleased, though will not try to guage the reader's response.

"What if they don't like it and slam it shut after reading three pages and throw it against a wall? But in a way, I think it's none of my business." Timeline is published by Century, £16.99 Jurassic Park author created ER | Toronto Star Entertainment Jurassic Park author created ER Michael Crichton made scientific research both terrifying and irresistible in such thrillers as Jurassic Park , Timeline and The Andromeda Strain . By Hillel ItalieASSOCIATED PRESS Thu., Nov. 6, 2008 NEW YORK–Michael Crichton made scientific research both terrifying and irresistible in such thrillers as Jurassic Park, Timeline and The Andromeda Strain. The million-selling author died Tuesday in Los Angeles at age 66 of cancer. "Through his books, Michael Crichton served as an inspiration to students of all ages, challenged scientists in many fields, and illuminated the mysteries of the world in a way we could all understand," his family said in a statement.

Crichton, a doctor by training, was an experimenter and popularizer known for his stories of disaster and systematic breakdown, such as the rampaging microbe of The Andromeda Strain or the dinosaurs running amok in Jurassic Park. Many of his books became major Hollywood movies, including Jurassic Park, Rising Sun and Disclosure. Article Continued Below Crichton himself directed and wrote The Great Train Robbery and he co-wrote the script for the blockbuster Twister. In 1994, he created the award-winning TV hospital series ER. He's even had a dinosaur named for him, Crichton's ankylosaur. "Michael's talent out-scaled even his own dinosaurs of Jurassic Park," said Jurassic Park director Steven Spielberg, a friend for 40 years. "He was the greatest at blending science with big theatrical concepts, which is what gave credibility to dinosaurs again walking the Earth. ... Michael was a gentle soul who reserved his flamboyant side for his novels. There is no one in the wings that will ever take his place." John Wells, executive producer of ER, called the author "an extraordinary man.

Brilliant, funny, erudite, gracious, exceptionally inquisitive and always thoughtful." "No lunch with Michael lasted less than three hours and no subject was too prosaic or obscure to attract his interest. Sexual politics, medical and scientific ethics, anthropology, archeology, economics, astronomy, astrology, quantum physics and molecular biology were all regular topics of conversation." Neal Baer, a physician who became an executive producer on ER, was a fourth-year medical student at Harvard University when Wells, a long-time friend, sent him Crichton's script. "I said, `Wow, this is like my life.' Michael had been a medical student at Harvard in the early '70s and I was going through the same thing about 20 years later," said Baer. ER offered a fresh take on the TV medical drama, making doctors the central focus rather than patients. In the early life of ER, Spielberg and Crichton, who hadn't been involved in medicine for years, would take part in writers' room discussions. In recent years, he was the rare novelist granted a White House meeting with President George W.

Bush, perhaps because of his skepticism about global warming, which Crichton addressed in the 2004 novel State of Fear. Crichton's views were strongly condemned by environmentalists, who charged the author with damaging efforts to pass laws to reduce emissions of carbon dioxide. If not a literary giant, he was a physical one, standing 6 feet 9 inches and ready for battle with the press. In a 2004 interview with the Associated Press, Crichton came with a tape recorder, textbooks and a pile of graphs and charts as he defended State of Fear and his take on global warming. "I have a lot of trouble with things that don't seem true to me," Crichton said at the time, his large, manicured hands gesturing to his graphs. "I'm very uncomfortable just accepting. There's something in me that wants to pound the table and say, `That's not true.'" He spoke to few scientists about his questions, convinced he could interpret the data himself. "If we put everything in the hands of experts and if we say that as intelligent outsiders, we are not qualified to look over the shoulder of anybody, then we're in some kind of really weird world," he said.

A new novel by Crichton had been tentatively scheduled to come next month, but publisher HarperCollins said the book was postponed indefinitely because of his illness. One of four siblings, Crichton was born in Chicago and grew up in Roslyn, Long Island. His father was a journalist and young Michael spent much of his childhood writing extra papers for teachers. In Grade 3, he wrote a nine-page play that his father typed for him, making carbon paper copies so other kids could learn their parts. He was tall, gangly and awkward and used writing as a way to escape. Mark Twain and Alfred Hitchcock were his role models. Figuring he would not be able to make a living as writer, and not good enough at basketball, he decided to become a doctor. He studied anthropology at Harvard College and later graduated from Harvard Medical School. During medical school, he turned out books under pseudonyms. (One nom de plume was Jeffrey Hudson, a 17th-century dwarf in the court of King Charles II of England.) He had modest success with his writing and decided to pursue it.

His first hit, The Andromeda Strain, was written while he was still in medical school and quickly caught on upon its 1969 release. It was a featured selection of the Book-of-the-Month Club and was sold to Universal for $250,000. "A few of the teachers feel I'm wasting my time and that in some ways I have wasted theirs," he told The New York Times in 1969. "When I asked for a couple of days off to go to California about a movie sale, that raised an eyebrow." Crichton was married five times and had one child. A private funeral is planned. 'Jurassic Park' author Michael Crichton dies at 66 | ABS-CBN News 'Jurassic Park' author Michael Crichton dies at 66 Reuters Posted at Nov 06 2008 08:28 AM | Updated as of Nov 06 2008 04:38 PM Share Pinterest LOS ANGELES – Best-selling U.S.

author Michael Crichton, who wrote such novels as "The Andromeda Strain" and "Jurassic Park" and created the popular TV drama "ER," has died unexpectedly of cancer at age 66, his family said on Wednesday. Crichton, a medical doctor turned novelist and filmmaker whose books have sold more than 150 million copies worldwide, died on Tuesday in Los Angeles after what his family described as a "courageous and private battle against cancer." "Michael's talent out-scaled even his own dinosaurs of 'Jurassic Park,'" filmmaker Steven Spielberg, who directed the blockbuster movie version of that novel and its sequel, "The Lost World," said in a statement. "He was the greatest at blending science with big theatrical concepts, which is what gave credibility to dinosaurs again walking the Earth." Spielberg added: "Michael was a gentle soul who reserved his flamboyant side for his novels. There is no one in the wings that will ever take his place." The family statement, which was released through a publicist, called Crichton's death "unexpected" but released few other details about his passing and requested privacy.

Born in Chicago on October 23, 1942, Crichton wrote his first novels while attending Harvard Medical School. He was awarded his medical degree in 1969, the same year his first major best seller, "The Andromeda Strain," was published. Killer organisms, robot gunslingers A global warming skeptic, he stirred controversy with his 2004 best-seller on the subject, "State of Fear," in which the main villains are eco-terrorists. Most of his work reflected his medical training, including "The Andromeda Strain," a techno-thriller about scientists battling a space-borne killer microorganism. "Andromeda" also was the first novel by Crichton to be made into a Hollywood film. He followed that success with "The Terminal Man," "The Great Train Robbery" and "Congo." He wrote and directed the 1973 film "Westworld," starring Yul Brynner as a robot gunslinger run amok in a futuristic theme park. It was the first major Hollywood film to use computer digitized images and spawned a short-lived TV series.

But Crichton remains best known for "Jurassic Park" and "The Lost World," which became two of the top-grossing films of the 1990s. He co-wrote the screenplay for "Jurassic Park" and for the 1996 tornado thriller "Twister." Also during the 1990s he published such popular novels as "Rising Sun," "Disclosure," and "Timeline." He followed in this decade with "Prey," "State of Fear" and "Next." His 1976 novel "Eaters of the Dead" was made into the 1999 film "The 13th Warrior." Crichton won a number of writing and film awards and an Emmy for his work on "ER," the popular and long-running NBC television hospital drama currently in its final season.

"While the world knew him as a great storyteller that challenged our preconceived notions about the world around us -- and entertained us all while doing so -- his wife Sherri, daughter Taylor, family and friends knew Michael Crichton as a devoted husband, loving father and generous friend who inspired each of us to strive to see the wonders of our world through new eyes," his family said in the statement. "He did this with a wry sense of humor that those who were privileged to know him personally will never forget." Share Jurassic Park author Michael Crichton dies at 66 | Reuters Wed Nov 5, 2008 | 5:31 PM EST "Jurassic Park" author Michael Crichton dies at 66 1/2 Author Michael Crichton is shown in this May 2000 file photo. Reuters/Jeff Christensen + 2/2 Author Michael Crichton is shown in this undated publicity photograph. Crichton, who wrote such novels as ''The Andromeda Strain'' and ''Jurassic Park,'' and created the popular TV drama ''ER,'' has died at 66, his family said on November 5, 2008.

Reuters/Handout + By Dan Whitcomb | LOS ANGELES LOS ANGELES Best-selling U.S. author Michael Crichton, who wrote such novels as "The Andromeda Strain" and "Jurassic Park" and created the popular TV drama "ER," has died unexpectedly of cancer at age 66, his family said on Wednesday. Crichton, a medical doctor turned novelist and filmmaker whose books have sold more than 150 million copies worldwide, died on Tuesday in Los Angeles after what his family described as a "courageous and private battle against cancer." "Michael's talent out-scaled even his own dinosaurs of 'Jurassic Park,'" filmmaker Steven Spielberg, who directed the blockbuster movie version of that novel and its sequel, "The Lost World," said in a statement. "He was the greatest at blending science with big theatrical concepts, which is what gave credibility to dinosaurs again walking the Earth." Spielberg added: "Michael was a gentle soul who reserved his flamboyant side for his novels.

There is no one in the wings that will ever take his place." The family statement, which was released through a publicist, called Crichton's death "unexpected" but released few other details about his passing and requested privacy. Born in Chicago on October 23, 1942, Crichton wrote his first novels while attending Harvard Medical School. He was awarded his medical degree in 1969, the same year his first major best seller, "The Andromeda Strain," was published. KILLER ORGANISMS, ROBOT GUNSLINGERS A global warming skeptic, he stirred controversy with his 2004 best-seller on the subject, "State of Fear," in which the main villains are eco-terrorists. Most of his work reflected his medical training, including "The Andromeda Strain," a techno-thriller about scientists battling a space-borne killer microorganism. "Andromeda" also was the first novel by Crichton to be made into a Hollywood film.

He followed that success with "The Terminal Man," "The Great Train Robbery" and "Congo." He wrote and directed the 1973 film "Westworld," starring Yul Brynner as a robot gunslinger run amok in a futuristic theme park. It was the first major Hollywood film to use computer digitized images and spawned a short-lived TV series. But Crichton remains best known for "Jurassic Park" and "The Lost World," which became two of the top-grossing films of the 1990s. He co-wrote the screenplay for "Jurassic Park" and for the 1996 tornado thriller "Twister." Also during the 1990s he published such popular novels as "Rising Sun," "Disclosure," and "Timeline." He followed in this decade with "Prey," "State of Fear" and "Next." His 1976 novel "Eaters of the Dead" was made into the 1999 film "The 13th Warrior." Crichton won a number of writing and film awards and an Emmy for his work on "ER," the popular and long-running NBC television hospital drama currently in its final season.

"While the world knew him as a great storyteller that challenged our preconceived notions about the world around us -- and entertained us all while doing so -- his wife Sherri, daughter Taylor, family and friends knew Michael Crichton as a devoted husband, loving father and generous friend who inspired each of us to strive to see the wonders of our world through new eyes," his family said in the statement. "He did this with a wry sense of humor that those who were privileged to know him personally will never forget." (Editing by Sandra Maler) Michael Crichton: Science inspired his fiction - USATODAY.com Michael Crichton: Science inspired his fiction Updated Enlarge 2004 photo by Jim Cooper, AP "I don't want to just make it up": Author Michael Crichton, whose novels effortlessly blended science and suspense, died Tuesday after a battle with cancer. He was 66. MICHAEL CRICHTON BY THE NUMBERS 150 million: Number of books sold worldwide 22: Number of books published as Michael Crichton. Best sellers include The Andromeda Strain, Congo, Jurassic Park, Rising Sun, The Lost World and Next.

1966: Year Crichton published his first book, Odds On, under the name John Lange, while attending Harvard Medical School 4: Number of pseudonyms he published under: John Michael Crichton, Jeffrey Hudson, John Lange, and, with brother Douglas Crichton, Michael Douglas (on 1971's Dealing or The Berkeley-to-Boston Forty-Brick Lost-Bag Blues) 2.8 billion: Dollars generated worldwide by the 13 movies made from his novels and screenplays 8: Number of screenplays Crichton wrote or co-wrote (including 1993's Jurassic Park) 1994: Year TV show ER first aired (Crichton created and executive co-produced the medical drama.) 1996: Year he received an Emmy for ER 7: Number of movies he directed, including Westworld, Coma and The Great Train Robbery 148: Position at which Jurassic Park sequel The Lost World ranks on USA TODAY's list of top 150 best-selling books of the past 15 years By Bob Minzesheimer,USA TODAY He scared millions of us by cloning dinosaurs with prehistoric DNA in Jurassic Park and by unle

ashing a virus from outer space in The Andromeda Strain.

But author Michael Crichton, who died Tuesday at age 66, was more than just the king of the cinematic techno-thriller whose books and screenplays became 13 movies. He also created ER, one of TV's longest-running dramas. As a movie producer and director, he pioneered the use of computer-generated special effects. In best-selling novels, he raised contrarian questions about global warming and sexual harassment. And all that after graduating from Harvard Medical School. In a statement Wednesday, his family said Crichton died in Los Angeles after a "private" battle with cancer. His books sold 150 million copies worldwide. He never won a Pulitzer or was even nominated for a National Book Award, but did have a newly discovered dinosaur named for him in 2002: the Crichtonsaurus bohlini. At his best, he was a master at blending fact and fantasy. He was as much a researcher as a novelist who popularized technical topics and put the science back into science fiction. "I don't want to just make it up," he told USA TODAY in an interview in 1996.

"I'd rather have something with the awkward contours of real events." In Twister (1995), he explored the violence of nature. Sphere (1987) dealt with black holes. Rising Sun (1992) was about international economics, back when Japan seemed to be a threat. At 6-foot-9, Crichton was hard to miss. In 1995, Time crowned him "The Hit Man" in a cover story about his commercial success in books and movies. His breakthrough novel was The Andromeda Strain (1969), but his biggest hit was Jurassic Park (1990). Both it and its sequel, The Lost World (1995), were turned into blockbuster movies. When he was writing the original novel, he was asked what he was doing. He replied, "I'm writing the most expensive movie ever made." "That was said as a joke," he said later. "I thought, 'Who can make this?' This was in the late '80s. A hundred and fifty million? Maybe. Two-year-shooting script? Ridiculous.

Out of the question." Directed by Steven Spielberg, Jurassic Park went on to make $915 million worldwide. With $357 million in North American ticket sales, it's the 13th-highest-grossing movie of all time. In all, Crichton's books and screenplays generated $1.3 billion domestically and $2.8 billion worldwide. The adaptations lost some box-office steam late in his career (the $80 million Timeline, about time-traveling graduate students from Yale, earned just $19 million in 2003), but Crichton was one of the most powerful writers in Hollywood. He wrote and directed 1973's Westworld, about a Wild West theme park gone haywire. It pioneered the use of computer-generated special effects. He mined his own medical training to create ER, which made George Clooney a star and is now in its 15th and final season. "One of the things that distinguishes that show from other television shows is the degree to which it is based on real stories," Crichton said.

"Viewers can tell." His novel Airframe (1996), a technological whodunit about a midair accident, was triggered when he noticed a crew struggling to close a plane's door. That got him thinking: "This is nothing but a big machine that someone made. I had never thought of it that way before." The novel, which questioned air safety, also attacks TV disaster coverage for its focus on emotions at the cost of information. And that prompted a question in an interview with USA TODAY: Was it ironic that ER's creator was complaining about TV's superficiality? "Where's the connection?" he snapped in response. "Because ER is successful, I should think TV is wonderful? ER is entertainment; I'm talking about news. Once, those were very separate things. Now they're not, and that's part of the problem." He seemed to enjoy stirring up controversy with his fiction. Feminists didn't like Disclosure (1994), in which a male executive sues his female superior for sexual harassment. It was turned into a movie starring Michael Douglas and Demi Moore. Environmentalists attacked State of Fear (2004), which questioned whether global warming was a major threat.

It was a novel, but it won The American Association of Petroleum Geologists Journalism Award and praise from President Bush, who hosted Crichton at the White House. He was born Oct. 23, 1942, in Chicago and raised in Long Island, N.Y. His father was a journalist. "So it seemed like a normal occupation, to sit down and type something as your job," Crichton told the British newspaper The Guardian. "I was the weird kid who wrote extra assignments the teacher didn't ask for. "I just did it because I liked writing so much. I was tall and gangly and awkward and I needed to escape, I guess." His writing career began at 14, when he had an article published in the Travel section of The New York Times. He helped pay his way through medical school by writing mysteries, including A Case of Need, written under the pen name Jeffrey Hudson, which won the 1969 Edgar Award for Best Novel from the Mystery Writers of America. He was known as a workaholic. He was married five times and divorced four.

His fourth wife, Anne-Marie Martin, publicly complained after their divorce that his work habits left her feeling abandoned: "'It's like living with a body and Michael is somewhere else." He is survived by his wife, Sherri, and only child, a daughter, Taylor, 19. He cited his major influences as Arthur Conan Doyle, Mark Twain and Alfred Hitchcock. As a novelist, his plots were often better than his writing. But Crichton didn't seem bothered that he was more popular with readers than critics. He said his primary goal in writing books or making movies or TV shows was to "entertain people. It's fun to manipulate people's feelings and to be manipulated." As for critics, he said, "Every critic assumes he's a code-breaker; the writer makes a code and the critic breaks it. And it doesn't work that way at all.

As a mode of working, you need to become very uncritical." Contributing: Scott Bowles Michael Crichton - Telegraph Michael Crichton Novelist and screenwriter responsible for 'Jurassic Park', 'Westworld' and the TV series 'ER' Michael Crichton wrote books such as Jurassic Park and The Andromeda Strain Photo: AP Michael Crichton died aged 66 Photo: AP 9:00PM GMT 05 Nov 2008 Michael Crichton, the American writer, who died on Tuesday aged 66, was the author of such cutting-edge novels as Jurassic Park (1990) and Rising Sun (1992), both of which became blockbuster films; he also created the hugely successful television series ER. In 1994 he achieved the singular distinction of becoming the only creative artist to enjoy chart-topping success in America with a film, a television series and a novel, all at number one at the same time. Crichton's big theme with his techno-thrillers was the perversion of science, offering his readers relentless action plots driven by a classic combination of instruction – his stories were packed with information – and cliff-hanging entertainment.

Intellectually gifted but notoriously awkward in company, Crichton came to writing by way of a dazzling academic career, including a year at Cambridge as a visiting lecturer. Back in America, by the time he qualified as a doctor he had already written nearly a dozen thrillers and knew that his future lay in writing rather than medicine. His collaborator in films, Steven Spielberg, regarded Crichton as an inspired visionary who, time and again, "identified the hot-button issue of the day and hit it ahead of anyone else": rogue science in Jurassic Park and Japanese economic expansion in Rising Sun. Related Articles Author Michael Crichton dies 05 Nov 2008 Other admirers praised Crichton as a superb storyteller with an eclectic mind; pre-Rowling, in the late 1990s, he was the most successful author in the world. The Sunday Telegraph called him "an entertainment industry powerhouse" whose annual earnings were estimated by Forbes, the American financial magazine, at more than $20 million. But Crichton's take on science had its critics.

His conservative line on climate change, to the effect that environmentalists had overstated the case for global warming, played so well with the administration of President George W Bush that he was summoned to the White House and invited to testify at Senate committee hearings. When the journalist Michael Crowley accused him of becoming one of the experts he so despised in his books, Crichton retaliated by including in his dyspeptic 15th novel, Next (2006), a character called Mick Crowley, a political columnist and closet paedophile accused of raping his two-year-old nephew. The real Crowley, who had railed against Crichton's "breathless, pot-boiler prose", was not the only critic irritated by Crichton's two-dimensional page-turners. Another complained that to call his characters cardboard "would be to endow them with a misleading sense of profundity". Crichton himself would swat away such swipes with a flick of his cheque-book, for his polemical tales earned him a fortune in book sales – reckoned in 2006 to exceed 150 million – and a further fortune, many times over, in film rights and screenplays, all written by himself.

Crichton, who was 6ft 9in, also towered over his rivals as America's most successful screenwriter, occupying a unique niche at the centre of Hollywood power, yet utterly removed from it. Having produced a novel, he would also turn in a first-draft screenplay, structuring the story as a film. But he was impatient of directors who wanted him to develop nuanced characters or polish up his plots and would simply walk away. By the early 1990s, as Variety noted, Crichton – the high priest of "high concept" – had mastered "the process" while demonstrating disdain for it. His film career began in the early 1970s when, as an eager Harvard and Cambridge-educated physician, Crichton directed his first film, Westworld (1973), shot on a shoestring budget and starring Yul Brynner. Dividing his time between directing films and writing screenplays and novels, Crichton set his next book in 19th-century Britain with The Great Train Robbery (1975), which he subsequently adapted for the screen.

Released in 1979, the film was admired for its accurate portrayal of life in mid-Victorian England. It starred Sean Connery, who later took the lead in the film of Rising Sun (1993), for which Crichton also wrote the screenplay. In 1994 Crichton created the hit medical television series ER, which became the most popular drama series on American television, and which was also watched by more than four million British viewers a week. Such was its success that in 1998 NBC paid $13 million per episode to renew the series. John Michael Crichton was born on October 23 1942 in Chicago, the eldest son of a journalist. He was only 14 when a travel piece he had written was published in The New York Times, and four years later, in 1960, he enrolled at Harvard with ambitions to become a writer. When an English professor criticised his writing style, however, Crichton switched to anthropology, and on graduating in 1964 won a fellowship at Cambridge University; he spent a year there as a visiting lecturer in anthropology.

Returning to the United States in 1966, he entered Harvard medical school and, under the pseudonym John Lange, wrote eight novels in the space of six years in order to support himself. As Jeffery Hudson he also published a medical detective story, A Case of Need (1968). The prolific Crichton churned out these early thrillers at the remarkable rate of 10,000 words a day. Although he was awarded a medical degree in 1969, and spent a year as a post-doctoral fellow at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in California, he had already determined to be a writer rather than a doctor. In 1969 he produced the best-selling novel The Andromeda Strain, about four scientists racing against the clock to save the world from a lethal, alien strand of bacteria. While critics applauded the speed of its breakneck plot and hailed what one called its "terrifying air of authenticity", Crichton followed up with something totally different, a non-fiction study of five patients he had observed during a seven-month period at a hospital in Massachusetts.

Even the title – Five Patients: The Hospital Explained (1970) – struck an unexpectedly sober note. Crichton returned to the fiction bestseller lists with The Terminal Man (1972), a modern reworking of the Frankenstein story that received a critical drubbing. A further 14 thrillers followed, seven of which were turned into films, including Lost World: Jurassic Park (1997). His non-fiction included Jasper Johns (1977), a biography of the artist, and Electronic Life: How to Think About Computers (1983), a handbook for those intimidated by information technology. Crichton spent years of his life in therapy: as an adolescent he felt isolated by his height, and as an adult by his intellect. During the 1970s and 1980s he consulted psychics and enlightenment gurus, who drew him out of himself and, as he put it, improved his karma. His working routine was rigorous and unforgiving: during the six or seven weeks it took him to draft a book, he withdrew completely to follow what he called "a structured approach" of ritualistic self-denial.

As he reached the end of each book, he would rise earlier each day, finally going to bed at 10pm and getting up at 2am. The result would typically be professional if slightly perfunctory, businesslike and mechanical. His partly autobiographical Travels appeared in 1988. Nearly 20 years after taking up meditation to relax, Crichton had retained his chiselled good looks, and in 1992 was ranked among People magazine's 50 most beautiful people. He had recently been suffering from cancer. Michael Crichton was five times married; his first three marriages having ended in divorce, in 1987 he married Anne-Marie Martin, an actress, with whom he wrote the screenplay for the film Twister (1996), and with whom he had a daughter. This marriage was dissolved in 2003, and he is survived by his daughter and his fifth wife Sherri Alexander.

Question: Who wrote 'Jurassic Park' and created the TV series ER?
Answer: Michael Crichton